*****
I realise that the forum reviews probably still have that break error, but I can't hold off with this. I've had a number of conversations with other aus-charters about my occasional hesitations towards (DJ) Mustard and how I was never too keen on the offbeat hey thingy that appeared in so many of his productions. Rarely enough to be completely put off a song (that I know of) but often something that impacts a track in a negative way. It's clearly different to a producer's adlib in that sense. I charted "No Mediocre" by T.I. which had this in its production; but "Strive" by A$AP Ferg did not. Here is a totally different story though. Not only would I have probably not picked this as a Mustard production (the adlib is surprisingly easy to mistake for Murda Beatz or something) but it might go some way in explaining why so many producers are getting official credit in recent years. Perhaps as rap continues to rapidly evolve, producers are becoming less idiosyncratic and it might be the worry that there is less discussion about them if they don't make it more clear it's their production. I can't say I always research this, but maybe it has nothing to do with the idiosyncratic thing. Heck, pretty much everything on "NOT ALL HEROES WEAR CAPES" would have been hard to mistake for anything other than a Metro Boomin production. I like Migos. If you didn't notice already, long gone are the days where Kanye, Jay and Kendrick dominate my hip hop listening and the increased diversity has played well for the likes of Quavo and Offset, but also Travis Scott, NAV, Denzel Curry, Jay Rock and Rich Brian. The interesting thing is that these rappers are all easily distinguishable and arguably becoming more so, while the producers in some respects are going in the other direction (admittedly I've already said this theory can be disputed though for sure). As for Migos, I remember the first time hearing "Bad and Boujee" sort of being a moment where a rap song just sounded cool and that little would result from that. Then came the slow growth that song would see, then the lateness of "T Shirt", "Stir Fry" and then finally timing things perfectly with "Walk It Talk It". The rest is history of course. Like many rappers seem to be though, Migos are still very much a singles/individual songs artist and it may explain why most of my favourite albums in 2018 were still largely alt/rock/indie, whilst the songs list included far more rap than ever. "Pure Water" is a Venn diagram I am all too familiar with. As is often the case with Migos songs, the catchiness of Quavo's hook is complemented by the flow of not only Offset's verse but also his own. This is a rare case where Takeoff also is much of the reason why this excels, with his verse standing out in such a way. The production is a real step up from Mustard too, which really makes this feel like a complete product. I haven't always been a Mustard fan, but now I see a lot of tings. 5.5 | 
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